All Magic Comes With a Price
by MissieMurder
Summary: Emma and Hook are provided with a deal from the deadly Peter Pan himself. (This is set after E7S3)


Silence. Only silence and passing glances as Emma and her crew begin through the woods again. David is carrying Henry's limp body in his arms, and he keeps giving sad looks to his wife, who still refuses to speak to him. Hook is beside Neal, even though he is very obviously uncomfortable, but everyone figures it would be best to leave Regina and Emma in the front because they are the two parents of Henry. Neal was the birth father of course, but nobody really counted him as the father. Emma and Regina were his parents, that was that.

As they began to cut through denser brush, they found another small camp. Pan was standing there, his back turned to them, his foot tapping on the ground.

"It took you long enough to find me, Emma," The boy's deep english accent said softly, turning on his heels and smiling devilishly. She was frozen in anger and fear, clenching her fists. She ran at him, weilding her cutlass, but he disappeared into purple mist in front of her and appeared behind her. Emma wheeled around and made an angry grunt as she still attempted to stab his stupid body. She gave an exhausted glance to her mother, Mary Margaret, and turned again to face Pan.

"May I speak to you and the drunk alone?" Pan said, waving his hand, which caused ropes to magically tie around everyone and a rag to be stuffed in their mouths. They struggled, and Emma went to help them, but Pan's magic stopped her from getting too close to them.

"Now, then," Pan began, putting his hands behind his back and circling the two. His eyes landed on Emma's, and she stared straight back with venom in her eyes. "Hook, you know you want everything to be okay for your bonnie lass, don't you? You want her son to live, and want her life to be okay?"

Before Hook could even do so much as nod his head, Emma piped up angrily, "What are you trying to do?"

Pan waved his hand, and suddenly the three of them were in a bookstore, a modern one, it looked. Hook knew this had to be an illusion, but he said nothing.

"If you two can survive an entire book from the 21st century, then you can have everything back. Call it a promise. It's for my dear old friend Neal," Pan said with a grin, but Hook's eyebrow raised in confusion.

"What's the catch?" Hook demanded, beginning to reach for his sword.

"The catch is, dear Killian, you have to choose which book. Emma cannot aid you in this decision, just pick one from any shelf. It's up to you." His manevolent blue eyes were as haunting as any ghost, and Hook felt his heart fall into his stomach. If he picked a wrong one, what would happen? His face goes pale and he nods solemnly. He gives Emma's hand a reassuring squeeze, one that she didn't seem to like at first but gave into later, and took to the shelves.

There's thousands of books. Tens of thousands, even. There's people crowding all the isles, talking, chanting, gathering. Hook didn't like this modern bookstore, what with it's bright light and many customers. He could have sworn he saw children's toys somewhere in between all of the bookshelves. Suddenly, a black cover catches his eye. Hook was known for spotting gold in a place so full-up. He brings it off the shelf and glances over at Emma for reassurance, watching her face drop. Emma looks at her feet a Pan smiles with all of his ferocious teeth and says loudly,

"The Hunger Games, hm? Lovely choice, dear Killian."

Emma's eyes flutter open gently, and taking a look around her, she finds herself in an oddly-lit room, so white and sterile, wearing an odd hospital-gown looking thing. She's laying on her back, with two people huddling a few feet from her and mixing something in a bowl. There were little silver tables with mascara, eyeliner, and oddly colored eyeshadow pallets. Another table gave her a whole selection of tweezers, and nail clippers, and a strange spiral-y object that she hoped they didn't intend to use on her. Emma sat up, freshly-ironed blonde curls bouncing down below her breasts.

Emma silently grabs onto the spiral-object, keeping it at her side as a weapon in case they turned on her and decided to murder her right then and there. She had skipped a few parts in the Hunger Games while she was reading it, so she doesn't know what is going on or where she is. The two odd people turn and see her as she begins to try to leave and they hobble over, each on heels higher than she'd ever seen. They gently grab her arms and say, "No, dear" before sitting her down again. One of them, which has bright yellow hair and piercing blue eyes, takes away her weapon and sets it on the table.

"Where am I?" Emma demands.

"You fainted when your name was reaped. You were out for a while- we thought you died to be honest- so while you were out we curled your hair and did your makeup. We also tweezed your eyebrows a bit, which was exceedingly difficult since you kept squirming. Anyway, we have your dress in another room over there, if you'd like to go get changed before the ceremony," The woman with the bright yellow hair explains, pointing to the small changing room in the corner. It had a thin red curtain across it and Emma could faintly make out a large mirror through the very thin fabric.

Emma makes her way into the dressing room and takes off the very delicate hospital-gown looking cloak that wrapped around her body. She takes a long white dress down from the hanger and stares at it for a long time. It reminds her of the wedding dresses she used to dream about when she was little. It's exactly how she always imagined it. It was snow-white with silver trimmings and a lace top covering her cleavage and collarbone. It slips on easily, fitting into every contore of her slim body. She beams at herself in the mirror, trying to take in the fact that she actually looks presentable in this wedding-dress like gown. She twirls a little for herself, but when she whirls around to the exit of the dressing room, she stops short and sees her two stylists staring at her through the fabric.

"Ready to go?" They ask in unison, smiling at her as she comes out of the curtains, red-faced.

"Ready as I'll ever be," Emma says to herself keeping her hands by her sides and trying to force a smile as she glances at the other tributes. Emma unsteadily stands on the carriage and shuts her eyes to shut everything out for a second when the carriage wobbles. Emma's eyes open quickly and she stares in slight awe when Hook is beside her, cleaned up nicely with an outfit bright white like her own. His beard is trimmed back and his hair is gelled and brushed back. Emma tries to hide her smile.

"You look ridiculous in white," She says with a smile, but then looks at her hips and hands. "So do I, I guess. We both look equally ridiculous." Hook's sullen, angry expression breaks into a little bit of laughter.

"I nearly stabbed that woman who was dressing me up in this monkey-suit," Hook says softly, his accent sending a shiver up her bare spine. Her smile fades, and she looks at her feet.

"I can imagine how freaked you must have been. All of this is completely new to you; you don't even know what to expect," Emma mutters, trying to push away the thought of his possible dying in these games.

"Explain it to me then, it seems we have a little time to talk," Hook says gently, "Did you read the whole thing?"

"No," Emma replies, "I skipped through it a little, but the book is about this girl who lives in a poor part of the country, and the governent likes to keep them on a tight leash. To prove the government's power, they hold an annual 'Hunger Games' every year where they randomly choose one boy and one girl from each 12 district. Um, and then at the end the main character and the boy that was also chosen don't want to kill eachother so they threaten to kill themselves and have no winner." Hook's eyes widen.

"We're killing _children_?" He whispers, his eyes wondering a little, both in fear and sadness. "I don't think I can do this, Swan." Emma sighs.

"I don't know how it's supposed to make sense that we're fighting children, because both of us aren't even close to being kids. You're over 200 for god's sake!" Emma laughs, but she finds herself stopping quickly and just watching Hook beaming at her. Emma looks down and her eyes go wide.

"The Quarter Quell," She whispers, dread in her gaze.

"The Quarter-huh-?-" Hook manages to say just as the carriage begins to quickly move down the carpet. He's suddenly looking forward, along with Emma, as they nervously scan the crowds of cheering, oddly dressed people. When they finally come to the end of the carpet and all of the different carriages line up in a circle around the President's balcony, the tall man steps out and smiles grimly at the tributes. He announces everyone's name, much to Hook's surprise, and after that's all over, Hook and Emma are separated and put into their battle gear. Emma gives her companion a last nod and solemn glance as he is dragged away.


End file.
